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TERCENTENNARY CELEBRATION OF THE BIRTH OP 
SHAKESPEARE. 



Reprinted from the Historical and Genealogical Register for July, 1864. 



Saturday, April 23. 

This being the day which was to be celebrated in England as the 
three hundredth anniversary of the birth of Shakispeare, the society 
observed it by appropriate exercises, as suggested by Rev. Mr. Bart- 
let, of Chelsea (ante, p. 21<3), in the hall of the House of Represen- 
tatives of the Commonwealth of Massachusetts. There is some 
doubt about the day of Shakespeare's birth; and, if it were well es- 
tablished, there is a question whether the date ought not to be reduced 
to New Style, which would fall on May 3d. This is the American cus- 
tom. Thus, the landing of Columbus, Oct. 12, 0. S., or 21, N. S., 
1492, and the birth of Washington Feb. 11, 0. S., or 22, N. S., 1732, 
are celebrated by us Oct. 21st and Feb. 22d. The society thought 
best however, to observe the same day as our English brethren. 

"It was," says the Boston Saturday Evening Gazette, to which we 
are indebted for this report, " an occasion of profound interest which 
was participated in by a distinguished and brilliant audience. The 
exercises were commenced at precisely 3 o'clock. Dr. Winslow Lew- 
is, Chairman of the Committee of Arrangements, was gratified to an- 
nounce that the Society was honored by the presence of one of its dis- 
tinguished members — the Governor of the Commonwealth. ' You all 
know,' continued Dr. Lewis, ' his readiness to do any required act 
of kindness to all. I, therefore, cordially invite him to iissume the 
chair and thereby confer upon me a great personal obligation, and on 
the Society the prestige of his eminent social position and excellence.' 

The invitation wis cordially approbated by the audience. 

Gov. Andrew, on assuming the chair, remarked that he had to as- 
sume easy and simple duties, and that he took the chair only for the 
purpose of introducing the gentlemen whose addresses and the gentle- 
man whose poem wouM form tin; attractions of the day. He would 
ask the attention of the audience to an address from Rev. James Free- 
man Clarke. 

Mr. Clarke commenced his Address by saying that so little is 
known of the outward life of Shakespeare, that the destructive critics 
of the twentieth century could easily explain away his existence and 
consider him as a mere myth. We do not know certainly when he was 
born, how his name is spelt, what his father did, whether Shakespeare 
had any edut ation, or anything about him from his birth to his mar- 
riage. We know that he married, when only ei'ihteen, a woman 
eight years older than himself, that he went to London, became an 
actor, dramatic writer and proprietor of a theatre, wrote two plays a 
year, became rich, went back to Stratford, and died aged fifty-two. 
'We know that he was contemporary with Sir Walter Raleigh, Spen- 
ser, Lord Bacon Coke, Cecil. Hooker, Montaigne, Cervantes, Tasso, 
Galileo, Descartes, Rubens the artist, Grotius, Marlowe, Chapman, 



— and that not one of them mentions his name, nor he theirs. He is 
spoken of with love and respect in his life time by Ben Jonson; by- 
Meres in 1598, when Shakespeare was still in London; by the Earl 
of Southampton, who calls him his especial friend; and possibly also 
by Spencer. After his death he was almost forgotten for a hundred 
years, though Milton, Dryden and others continued to admire him. 
Voltaire compared his Hamlet to the work of a drunken savage, and 
says it contains " grossieretes abominables " and " folles non moins 
degoutantes." He was rediscovered by Lessing and Goethe, rehabili- 
tated by Schlegel, Coleridge, Lamb — and is now considered not only 
as a wild genius, but also a consummate artist, by all critics. 

By the matured opinion of the world he stands at the summit of 
Human Intelligence, the greatest brain God ever sent upon earth. 
But;ias L)iagination is his chief faculty, it follows that Imagination is 
the chief faculty of the human mind. His Imagination is the king — 
it controls his Reason, Judgment, Fancy, Humor, Wit — and brings 
each drama into a unity of tone and idea. His characters differ from 
all other creations in being growths from within, not being made from 
without. He proves man to be a microcosm, a world in himself — for 
he created out of himself a world of truth and reality. His moral in- 
fluence does not consist in his rewarding the good and punishing the 
bad; but in his always making goodness attractive, and vice repul- 
sive — and in liis showing that there is in man a power to conquer the 
evil in himself. He is gross, but not as gross as his age — but though 
gross is never vicious. Compared with the other writers of his day, 
he is chaste as a saint. His respect for women, and his admirable 
pictures of female cbaracters, show his purity of soul. He belongs 
to England and America — and both may be benefited by his lessons, 
and his wisdom. 

John H. Sheppard, Esq., followed with beautifully written and im- 
pressive remarks, introductory to a poem written for the occasion, in 
which he defepded Shakespeare from the loose and ill-considered 
charge sometimes brought agninst him, of improprieties and immoral- 
ities of his writings. Shakespeare was pure; and if, now and then, 
an expression creeps out that offends prudish modesty, it must be ta- 
ken as sn excres ence that belongs more to the age in which he wrote 
than to Shakespeare himself. 

Mr. Sheppard was led by his subject to a youthful reminiscence. 
He describe;! in a vivid, picturesque manner his first night at a thea- 
tre, long years ago, in his college days. The house was the Federal 
Street Theatre; the play was Hamlut. Mr. Cooper was the Hamlet 
and Mrs. Powell the Ophelia. Mr. S. spoke of the novelty of the 
scene, the n anly dignity of Cooper; his deep-toned, mellow voice; no 
bellowing and ranting;, like some of the popular actors of the present 
day — the beauty and grace of Mrs. Powell — the excellence of Mr. 
Bernard — the Warren of that day — and the fairy-like appearance of 
the entire scene, with a richness of coloring and a vivacity that seem- 
ed to belong more to the vigorous fancy of youth than to the mature 
and ripened judgment of a septuagenarian. He became young again 
as his mind went back to halcyon days and that supreme scene which 
was so indelibly impressed upon his memory. Mr. Sheppard's poem 



which followed was exceedingly beautiful and adapted to the occa- 
sion. 

Rev. Mr. Holland followed with " A Study of Shakespeare," that 
showed how well the speaker knew his subject, and how happily he 
could illustrate that subject to an intelligent and attentive audience. 
He said that, notwithstanding so little was known of Shakespeare's 
early life and the domestic incidents in his career, he was intimately 
and dearly known to us by our sympathies. Mr. Hollands effort 
was a masterly Shakespearian analysis. No one feature in the geni- 
us that he was endowed with was predominant; he had no pet char- 
acters; no idol; his tendencies were impartial; he was a witness who 
could not abate one jot of the truth he was obliged to utter; he was 
the morning star of true philosophy; the creator of the English dra- 
ma; the inspirer of all our literature; 

" Nothing can cover his high fame but heaven." 

This closed the proceedings, and the audience retired after a season 
of rare intellectual interest and enjoyment." 

ODE ON SHAKESPEARE'S BIRTHDAY. 
By John H. Sheppakd, Esq. 
In Stratford upon Avon 

Wliere the sileiit waters flow, 
The immortal Drama woke from sleep, 

Three hundred years ago; 
Then, as the long, dark ages rolled away, 
A light from Heaven shone on Shakespeare's face. 
Land of the illustrious Dead ! With thee this day, 
We love to linger near that hallowed place, 
For wert thou not the Fatherland of our New England race ? 

Beyond the Rocky Mountains, 

From the Golden Gate of fame, 
Far East to Schoodic's misty shores 

Is heard his honored name. 
Live where we may, such life-like scenes he drew, 
Arrayed in robes of beauty, all his own. 
Nature herself proclaims each picture true 
To Albion's echoing hills; — nor there alone, 
As e'en Niagara speaks in Fi ospero's thunder-tone. 

Ah ! what a halcyon memory 

Our school-boy days bring on, 
When young Othello told us how 

He Desdemona won. 
Where are the voices that once filled the air ? 
Let not stern manhood deem the illusion wrong, 
When the boy dreamed the enchanted isle was there 
Near Academic grove, unknown to song 
Where Kennebec among the hills meandering glides along. 

« 
Not in the Tlieatre alone 

Is seen his wondrous power, 
Though some great actor tread the stage, 

The pageant of an hour; 
He visits many a humble home — and when 
Some brave thought stirs the heart by sorrow riven, 
We feel like heroes — though we live like men 
In lowly lot; for here full oft at even 
The liard of Avon sweeps th' iEolian harp of Heaven. 



JUUS41898 



England ! with all thy glory 

From the Druid days of old, 
Not Creey's pride, nor Agincourt, 
Nor Field of the Cloth of Gold, 
Shines with such virtue in all coming time 
As genius, learning, minstrelsy inspire. 
They fill the ideal world with thoughts sublime, 
Guiding Ambition's eye to aim far higher, 
Than light the flames of civil war, with strange, unholy fire I 

They gleam like stars in history 

Along a dreary waste, 
Who first enlarged the bounds of mind, 

Or raised the tone of taste. 
Thus Bacon looms up in that glorious age 
Of Spenser's lay and .Jonson's critic eye. 
When a Promethean spark illumed the Stage, 
And Shakespeare drew such scenes of time gone by 
That life a Drama seems, midst shadows of Eternity. 



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